


Harry Potter and the Witch With no Memory

by AzTheDragon



Category: Danny Phantom, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, more to be added later - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-08
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-08-07 13:15:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7716148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AzTheDragon/pseuds/AzTheDragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the Second War, Harry thought life would be easier. However, when the amnesiac witch Samantha Manson was put under Hogwarts' protection, things blew out of proportion again. Between dark creatures out to get Sam, a long forgotten mystery and an elusive guardian spirit that controls deadly ice, the new year at Hogwarts looks more and more like a repeat of the previous ones.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My works are NOT betaed, and the first 4 chapters of this particular fic are old. And I mean "years old". Back then I made more mistakes, but from the 5th chapter on, you'll probably notice a lot of changes in my style too. I've reread the previous chapters to correct the worst errors, but eh... can't do miracles.  
> Formatting might be odd too, because I saved this from internet pages since I had lost the original files I had on computer.
> 
> And so, since I resumed writing this, I decided to post this here too.
> 
> Enjoy!

In all her years of teaching at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, this was the first time that Professor Minerva McGonagall had to deal with such a situation. It was slowly bringing her a headache, which in itself was a wonder after the troubles of the recent years that escalated in the Battle of Hogwarts that ended the Second Wizarding War. Perhaps it was all because this was really sudden...

With a deep sigh, the aging witch sat at the headmaster desk and looked down at the elegantly written parchment held in her hands as if it could give her all the answers of the world. "Are you sure of this?"

Kingsley Shacklebolt, the new Minister for Magic, stood in front of her with a troubled expression of his own. "We are sure," he replied, glancing around the room to see how every single portrait had their eyes trained on them, silent and attentive. "The poor girl has no safe place to go and the American Ministry of Magic has no idea why the Dementors are so much after her."

Minerva finally placed the parchment on the desk and rubbed her forehead with one hand, trying to alleviate the increasing pressure. "And they thought that Hogwarts was the safest place for her to be. Especially after the recent events..." she said with an understanding nod.

The man standing in front of her gave a small smile. "Can't blame them," he said, referring to the American Ministry of Magic. "The kid got attacked eleven times in the last two weeks, several people nearly died by the Dementors' attacks and one nearly got the Kiss. As much as they try to protect her, the load is too much even for Salem's security..."

The headmistress drummed her fingers on the desk and let her thoughts wander for several long seconds. Taking the girl into Hogwarts would put the entire school in danger – _again_ _–_ but the idea of leaving an innocent, young witch at the mercy of one of the foulest creatures of the wizarding world made her insides twist in disgust.

"We're already three weeks into the school terms," she said after a while, finally taking her decision. "But sorting her in a house won't be a problem."

The Minister for Magic gave a smile of appreciation as he handed a few more parchments to Minerva. "I must warn you, though. The girl comes from Amity Park..." he took a pause and watched the witch's reaction for a moment. "You know what the wizardry community thinks of that place..."

Sharp eyes narrowed and Minerva resisted the urge to groan. "Amity Park..." she said slowly, rolling the city's name on her tongue, as if tasting the words. "Wizards and witches avoid that place at all costs... something about the place being full of uncontrolled environmental magic and being haunted by several highly destructive poltergeists..."

And she cut there because she was not going to delve into the rumor of the city disappearing altogether into thin air, dragged away from the world by some powerful poltergeist with the obsession of conquering the world...

"That city," Kingsley confirmed with a curt nod just before giving a deep sigh of his own. "And that is why everyone was surprised and not surprised at the same time to discover that she was a witch despite being already fifteen years old."

The headmistress raised an eyebrow at that and silently motioned for the man to go on while she idly browsed the parchments in front of her, quickly scanning everything that the American Ministry had found regarding the matter. It wasn't much, but it was better than having nothing to work with...

"Even if they detect magically endowed kids, no one sends owls over there. They just get lost or don't even dare to go near it. She would have been ignored altogether if it wasn't for the fact that they found her curled in front of the steps of Salem Witches' Institute, muttering incoherently about big, flying ghosts wearing black cloaks that brought cold and unhappiness when they got close," Shacklebolt was now waving a hand into the air as he got a little deeper into the story. "Took her three days to recover back to normality, but even then she could not recall what had happened to her, nor her own past save for a few personal details like her name, age and where she lived."

Minerva folded the parchments and neatly stacked them in front of her, planning to carefully read them later when she was alone. "A memory charm?" she asked that more to herself than to the man in front of her. Attacked by Dementors and Obliviated so much to the point of barely remembering her own name meant that whoever was behind the attacks didn't want to be discovered...

"We don't know," Kingsley spoke, rousing the headmistress from her thoughts. "No one was there with her when they found her, nor she had any letter explaining what happened. The American Ministry did some investigation, but then the Dementors started attacking one after another and they were too busy fending them off to do anything else."

"And that's why they are asking us to take over," Minerva now understood why the American Ministry was pleading Hogwarts so much to help. The girl was in grave danger and what better place to go than the school that had a heavy hand in defeating Voldemort and its army? She had to give them credit for being so honest with themselves and everyone else and admit that they just couldn't protect the young witch. "Alright, tell them that she is welcomed in our school and arrange a portkey as soon as you can."

"I knew I could count on you, Minerva," Kingsley smiled widely at seeing the witch's eyes. They were full of determination. "I'll get her here as soon as possible."

* * *

Being yanked by her navel and then dropped on the ground in a daze was not what Samantha "Sam" Manson called 'comfortable traveling'. They had mentioned to her that the first few times it would be unnerving and uncomfortable, but she had never thought that it would that much. After all, they had made it sound like it was a minor thing...

Her hair was sticking in every direction and her little ponytail was barely hanging on. Her clothes, a black tank top and skirt, dark purple stockings and black combat boots had fared much better in the travel and were only a bit ruffled while her duffel bag was resting at her feet in a twisted fashion.

"Sorry," the man said as he helped the girl up. "Perhaps we're too used to it and we just forget how our first travels were."

Sam narrowed her violet eyes, but gave a deep sigh and smiled. She couldn't hold a grudge to the man that had been stuck with her for two weeks and defended her from those Dementor things. Out of all the people that had been assigned to her protection, the Auror was the only one that hadn't quit yet. She could only be grateful to the wizard, because without him, she would be dead by now.

Patting the man on the back a couple of times, Sam shook her head and grabbed her bag, slinging it over her shoulder. Without being able to remember anything at all and too dangerous to go back to Amity Park, the American Ministry of Magic had kindly provided her with a few clothes to carry around. The lady that had accompanied her to shopping had let her chose what she wanted to wear and paid for it without complaining.

"Sam, are you sure you're going to be fine?"

The young witch looked up at her bodyguard and gave another amused smile as his light brown hair tumbled in front of his eyes. "Oh, don't worry yourself sick, Charlie," she said, moving her gaze to rest on the immense castle sitting on top of a rocky perch in front of an even bigger lake. It was really suggestive and her smile widened. "I bet I'm going to be perfectly fine in there!"

Charlie looked down at the black haired head with a frown, but eventually sighed in resignation. Already someone from Hogwarts was making his way towards them and his assignment to the girl had come to an end. It was a bit sad, though. After two weeks of sticking together and surviving the Dementors, he had come to appreciate the witty banters they occasionally had and her sharp mind whenever she focused on something she believed important.

"Alright, alright," he said, lazily raising his hands halfway in surrender. "You're going to be fine. But I'm going to miss you, kiddo."

Sam shot a glare at him, then rolled her eyes before focusing her attention to the boy striding towards them. He was of an average height and had round glasses on his nose, but what really struck her was his wild hair and the confident walk he unconsciously used. As if he was someone that had fought dangerous battles and had seen the next day to tell them.

_Just like him..._ she found herself thinking.

A sudden sharp pain shot through her head and she brought both hands up, clutching at her black hair as she whimpered, feeling an oncoming headache. She tried to control it, to stop thinking about anything, but she couldn't help it. The boy, who was now running to her after seeing her distress, had reminded her of someone. Only problem was that she couldn't remember who he was.

"It's another attack..."

The young witch looked up to see Charlie talk with the other boy, probably explaining what was happening, while green eyes peered down at her. "Don't worry," she managed to whisper as she tried to concentrate on the blue sky behind the black haired boy's left shoulder. Yet, no matter how much she tried, her eyes always found their way back to the green ones and the headache increased exponentially. "I'll... I'll be fine..."

She was so distraught and confused that she never realized that she was led through large corridors filled with animated paintings, nor that dozens of students of various ages turned their curious gaze to observe the odd trio, whispering amongst themselves. It wasn't until she was lowered onto a very comfortable bed that she finally snapped out of her painful trance and looked around.

It was another large room, with tall arches and windows, full of soft light coming from outside and rows of beds against each wall. No one was inside save for her, her two companions and a small kid sitting dazedly on the bed opposite hers, his eyes looking left and right and jumping at every small sound that reached his ears.

"Are you alright?"

Sam rubbed her forehead and propped her upper back against the pillow behind her, her violet eyes focusing on the unknown boy standing to her right. "Yeah... it was a bit stronger than the previous ones, but nothing I could handle..."

Charlie gave a deep sigh of relief and his shoulders slumped slightly. "Alright, kiddo," he said as he placed a hand on the girl's shoulder and squeezed gently. "Is there anything I can do for you?"

The young witch rolled her eyes and would have thrown her pillow at him if it wasn't the only one she had. "I'm fine!" she said with a playful laugh. "I'm just a bit tired, so I'll lay down for a while before I start exploring this place."

There was an awkward silence, then the American wizard took a deep breath and let it out in a whine. "Just... just try to not get into troubles... last time you explored you... ah... you were found in the middle of a totaled room... unconscious I might add..."

Sam crossed her arms and seemed to sink into her pillow, the smile transforming into a frown. "Not my fault that Dementor thing decided to pay me a visit..." she then paused and sharply gazed up at the Auror. "By the way, do you know who chased it away? From what I learned, Dementors don't just give up on a target like that..."

Charlie shrugged helplessly and looked up at the other boy, almost in search for help. "No," he said with a shake of his head. "Everything might have been upturned and destroyed, but nothing indicating to the presence of another wizard or witch was found."

The conversation was interrupted when the double doors at the end of the room groaned open, letting two elderly witches inside. Madam Poppy Pomfrey, healer of the school of Hogwarts, was wearing her usual red and white robe complete with the characteristic nun-like veil on her head to better indicate her role.

"My, my, my..." she said as grabbed Sam's face in her hands and turned it around slightly, her eyes never leaving the young witch's violet ones. "Just some exhaustion. Nothing a night of rest can't resolve."

Once she had finished her examination, Madam Pomfrey smiled and produced a glass and a bottle of clear liquid from the nearby cabinet. "Drink this," she explained as she poured some of the water like substance into the glass and handed it to Sam. "It'll help you sleep."

Without waiting for the girl to drink it, she nodded her head to the presents and turned around to attend to the boy on the other side of the room, talking to him in hushed tones so to not disturb. Sam watched her for a few seconds while sipping the odd beverage, then turned her eyes on the other elderly witch that had waited in silence.

Wearing a black and dark green robe and a tall pointy hat of the same colors adorned with long, dark feathers, her demeanor spoke of a strong and strict woman, but her eyes shone with hidden worry and kindness. She was authority, she knew it well, but that didn't stop her from caring about all the kids in the school.

"I'm Professor Minerva McGonagall," she said, voice firm and clear. Sam had the distinct feeling that this woman was not someone to cross in any way. "Welcome to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I'm sure your Ministry of Magic already explained to you about our world?"

The raven haired girl nodded faintly, letting her eyes close for a moment and her mind return to that day when she had been taken to the Ministry. Calling that day hectic was very little. There had been a lot of screaming going around when it came to her odd case and people were so angered at each other that they almost started throwing stuff at each other.

"Yeah..." Sam said after a while with a sigh. "They told me everything they knew, promised me they would help me figure out why I was found without memory at the steps of Salem's Institute... but then the Dementors started attacking and things got out of hand..."

She turned her head to look at Charlie on the other side of the bed and smiled gratefully. She would have never survived for two weeks if it hadn't been for him and his colleagues.

"Headmistress," the Auror lightly bowed his head in respect when McGonagall turned her attention to him. "With your permission, I will leave now. I presume my Ministry has already sent you all the information you need?"

"Yes, I received the papers yesterday morning," Minerva replied with a quick nod. "We'll take over from now on. Rest assured that Samantha Manson is safe here at Hogwarts."

The four spoke for a few more minutes after that until Sam was unable to hold in a huge yawn. It wasn't that late in the day, perhaps mid afternoon, but with the recent events and the change of hours, tiredness was finally taking over.

Professor McGonagall was the first to notice how weary the young witch was and gave a rare gentle smile. "I believe we can continue this discussion over in my office," she said, motioning for the American Auror to follow her. "In the meantime, Mr. Potter, could you please keep an eye on her? I'm sure that the Dementors and whoever is behind them still don't know where she is, but it's better be safe than sorry."

"I'll let Ron and Hermione know the situation then," the bespectacled boy replied in understanding. After all he went through the previous years, Harry knew how to deal with danger and he was thankful that Professor McGonagall was giving him so much trust and freedom of choice over the matter.

It was a couple of more minutes before the headmistress and the American Auror left to talk more privately, leaving them alone. Madam Pomfrey had already left for her office next to the infirmary and the kid on the other bed was sleeping peacefully.

With nothing else to do and Sam finally succumbing to the sweet call of sleep, Harry Potter, young Auror and temporary Professor of Defense Against Dark Arts sat on a chair and started to read some of the essays he had to correct. That is... until the room became cold and a familiar shaped shadow slowly blocked the fading sunlight from the window at his back.

Wand at the ready, he turned around to face the Dementor that had slipped inside Hogwarts unnoticed. However, when he was ready to cast a Patronus, he found himself facing nothing but a window and the last rays of a setting sun that slowly warmed the otherwise frigid air.

 


	2. Chapter 2

A week after her arrival at the magical school of Hogwarts, Sam found herself opening the door of Ollivander's shop for the fourth time. The store inside was as dusty and as gloom as she remembered, but unlike before, this time the owner, Garrick Ollivander, was waiting for her at the counter. Just like in the letter he had sent her that morning.

The old man perked up when she stepped inside, one hand instantly motioning for her to reach him and the small box sitting innocently on the wooden surface in front of him. "This is it!" he exclaimed excitedly, his body seemingly ready to jump up and down like a happy kid. "This is the right wand for you!"

Ronald Weasley, who had entered the shop shortly after Sam, stood behind the girl as she peered down at the closed box on the counter. "I thought you said that the cores you owned were afraid of her?" he asked, raising a red eyebrow in confusion at the sudden change of opinion of the wandmaker. "And we checked all the wands you had in here. Last time we spend three hours going through one hundred and fifteen of them..."

Mr. Ollivander looked up at the young man with his pale silvery eyes, pausing momentarily in his excitement to ponder about something only he knew of. "That is right..." he said after a while, his mouth stretching into another smile. "None of the cores I possess accept this young witch. But...!"

With a trembling hand, the wandmaker lifted the cover of the box, his shaky breaths almost echoing in the small shop. "You see... I had a strange dream last night..." he started once the lid was removed and an ebony wand was revealed. It was ten inches long and the black surface was so smooth that if the light was caught right, someone could see their faint reflection on it. "Never I had a dream like that..."

When he noticed that none of his two customers seemed to want to interrupt him, the old man sat on a stool behind the counter and looked at the wand with a strange shine in his eyes. "It was cold, Miss Manson. So cold that I believe even Dementors would fear it... The strange thing, however, was that the cold wasn't bothering me. It felt more like it was surrounding me like a blanket rather than seeping through my skin and bones," his voice became soft and it felt as if he was talking from somewhere distant, his gaze drifting onto the wall but not focusing on it. "And it felt pure. Not the kind of holy purity you find in an unicorn, but more of a... natural purity... like perfectly transparent ice or a crystal clear day in winter..."

Sam raised an eyebrow at that, knowing from previous encounters with the old wandmaker that he normally was not a storyteller. "So," she started with soft voice, not wanting to scare the man out of his thoughts. "What does that have to do with this wand?"

Garrick Ollivander remained motionless for a few more seconds before turning his pensive eyes onto the young witch. "It has everything to do with it, Miss Manson," he replied, waving his hand at the wand. "Because when I woke up from that dream, my hand was cold. Not freezing, but still too cold for the temperature of the room. It took me a couple of seconds to realize that I was holding something. Something special and powerful."

The elderly man took the wand from the box and carefully examined it. To normal people he appeared like he was just looking at its surface in search of physical flaws, but in truth he was listening to its feeling. After years upon years of experience, Mr. Ollivander perfectly knew how to understand them.

"At first I thought that it was unicorn's hairs," the wandmaker continued, chuckling upon feeling the disgruntlement coming from within the wood. Since the moment he had completed it, the wand didn't want to be held by his hands anymore. "Couldn't help the mistake, though. What I was holding were strands of hair, after all. But they are far too short to come from the tail or the mane of an unicorn, and their color is the same white of the fresh snow that falls from the sky."

Ollivander took a pause in his tale, humming to himself and letting his mind visualize that strange substance. "I don't know how those hairs found their way in my hand during the night, nor from what kind of creature they come from, but I had to try to use them. I had a hunch."

Through the whole tale, both Sam and Ron had said nothing, too caught up in the story to ask questions or interrupt. They were both standing at the counter, their hands gripping the wooden edge for support while their minds refused to take their attention away from the wandmaker's words.

"So..." the girl was the first to break the short silence that had befallen into the shop, her violet eyes glued on the ebony wand held by Mr. Ollivander. If she focused enough, she could feel some sort of strange energy emanating from within the wood, making her wish she could take it in her own hands. She resisted, though, not wanting to disrespect the man in front of her. "They're in there? The hairs, I mean..."

Garrick gave a wide smile as he presented the wand to the girl. "Indeed, Miss Manson," he replied joyfully, not bothered by the fact that such an experiment could have possibility blown up his shop. "Perhaps the name is not the right one, but I call this core 'Winter Spirit Hairs'. It kind of... fit..."

Sam reached up with her right hand and stopped just before her fingers brushed the black surface of the handle. Truth to be told, she was worried that even this wand would run away from her, scared of her magic. It was a stupid thought, really, but after hundreds of tries with different combinations of wood and cores, she couldn't help it.

She bit her lip, looking up at Ron first and then shifting her gaze onto the pale silver eyes of Mr. Ollivander. "Are you really sure that this is the right wand for me?" she asked, a light frown of suspicion appearing on her face. "That it will accept me?"

The wandmaker was quick in nodding. "I am sure of it. I don't exactly know why, Miss Manson. Wands chose their owners after all, but I feel that this one... I feel that this core was given to me so that you could have it. On top of that, I used ebony, a wood that seem to like you."

When Sam's fingers finally closed around the handle, no one expected the reaction that the touch instilled into the wand. Not even Mr. Ollivander could have foresee the blast of frigid air that invested him and the other two people inside his shop, forming frost on their clothes and onto everything else within the room.

Then, as quickly as it came, the gust of winter cold ceased and the wandmaker felt a peculiar feeling coming from Sam's wand. Even without touching it, he could feel the core reaching out, delighted to finally be with its owner and unexpectedly mutate itself to better adapt to the girl's own magic. Suddenly, a soft warmth radiating from the wand playfully touched their skins, casting the frigidness away like sunrays on a spring day until the temperature in the room returned to be the same it had been before the display of uncontrolled seasonal magic.

Mr. Ollivander was the first to react. With a little squeak, he reached for the wand with his hands, his eyes moist with unshed tears of joy, but refrained from touching the smooth surface, knowing that it would not be pleased to be touched by anyone but its owner. "I... I knew it..." he whispered, voice wavering with emotion. "This wand is unique, Miss Manson. Please... Please, take care of it. I feel that it will protect you at all costs."

Sam nodded, too stunned to say anything. She finally had a wand, but that was not what had rendered her speechless. As soon as she had touched it, just before the room was cast into a replica of winter weather, the wand had called her name. Not just a feeling. It had actually _said_ her name. It had echoed for a couple of seconds in her mind, longing and desperate. With the voice of a boy that she felt she knew, but could not place...

"I believe seven galleons will do, Miss Manson," Ollivander was still having troubles containing his happiness, his eyes never leaving the marvelous wand he had created. He was so focused onto his creation that he didn't notice Ron dropping seven gold coins onto the counter. He did notice, however, when Sam replaced the protesting wand into the box.

Lightly shaking his head to clear it enough to close the box and wrap it with brown paper, Ollivander mused upon what he was feeling from the wand. "It's very protective of you," he eventually said, using a string to tie the wrapping up. "I believe that it will do everything you ask of it, Miss Manson. It will even perform Dark Art spells without a hitch if it means saving your life, but don't let anger and hate cloud your judgment or you will lose control of it. With dire consequences, I fear."

Finally, the wandmaker held the completed package for Sam to take. "Don't worry, Mr. Ollivander," she replied, eyes shining with determination. "I won't use this wand for evil."

"Good to hear," Ron's voice filled the air, distracting the young witch from her conversation with Ollivander. Being there only as a guard for Sam, he hadn't felt the necessity to take an active part into the events between the two. Sure, the outburst of magic had been unlike anything he had seen, but that wasn't an excuse for him to butt in with random comments.

Sam would have replied with a comment depicting how much Ron was acting like a baby, but she couldn't exactly blame him. During her stay at Hogwarts she had taken to read books and newspapers to catch up with the recent happenings within the wizarding world, eventually discovering how much Ron had been involved into last year's war alongside his two best friends. It gave him all the rights in the world to be suspicious of anything powerful and uncontrollable.

Still, she couldn't repress a roll of her eyes and a smile directed at him. "Stop worrying. I won't turn into a Dark Witch just because I have something powerful in my hands," she said, silently thanking Mr. Ollivander for finally creating the right wand for her. He replied with a happy smile before disappearing into the back of the shop, cheerfully muttering to himself. "But if it makes you feel better, I'll let you know if I have any inclinations towards Dark Arts."

Without waiting for a reply from her bodyguard, Sam walked to the door and opened it, letting the outside air brush against her cheeks. It was the windy afternoon of a middle September day, with gray clouds so dark that they looked ready to release their wet load. It wasn't cold yet, but there was the distinctive scent of autumn leaves floating between the buildings, letting people know that summer and sunny days had come to an end. In a couple of weeks the temperatures would start to drop drastically, creating the perfect atmosphere for huddling around a fire with friends, hot beverages and sweet threats.

Once out of the wandmaker's shop, the two walked down the street in companionable silence, watching the everyday life bustle around them. No one paid them any attention, too busy minding their own business to cast glanced at the pair and marvel at how Sam stood out with her gothic style of clothes. It was a nice walk, but in the recent life of Ron Weasley, nice tended to not last for long.

It started with a few drops of water landing here and there, creating dark spots on the pavement. Then the cold set in, ruthlessly biting deeper and deeper into everyone's flesh. Life in the street abruptly halted, people dropped everything they were doing and rushed back into their homes. Who didn't live there, took refuge into a store or a pub while the owners closed the shutters and lowered curtains.

Within seconds, the once busy Diagon Alley became an empty street. Lights from the surrounding buildings flickered and dimmed for a short moment before disappearing, the growing darkness too strong for them to shine. The clouds overhead became a black curtain, heavy and oppressive, while the rain became freezing despite remaining liquid.

"Dementors..." Ron could recognize the foul creatures' presence anywhere and at any given time thanks to his previous encounters with them. He could feel the happiness and any shred of hope start to leave his body, faster and faster as the two floating figures closed onto them from the end of the street. "Stay close to me."

With ragged cloaks trailing behind them, the Dementors were slow in their advance, as if wanting to take their time in making them suffer. The one on the left even seemed to slightly flutter left and right, almost as if it was 'happy' to be on the hunt. But perhaps that was a trick of the darkness because, after all, the only way for the foul creatures to feel happiness was to drain it from humans.

Mustering his courage, or what was left of it, Ron took his wand out and pointed it at the two Dementors. It took him a couple of seconds to concentrate and find his happiest thought, but when he did, his body steeled and his arm stopped trembling.

" _Expecto Patronum!_ "

Thin filaments of bluish white light burst out of his wand and floated downwards until it wound together at his feet, forming a small, but fierce looking Jack Russell terrier. With the protection provided by the little dog, Ron and Sam felt some of the negativeness leave their bodies, enabling them to think more clearly.

Still, Ron's Patronus would be unable to tackle the two Dementors at the same time because of its small size. Nor the third one that suddenly floated into the street at their back, its breath rattling loudly into the otherwise silent air. He knew that he could fight the foul creatures one at a time and successfully chase them away, but he also knew that he would leave Sam unprotected if he made his Patronus attack.

It was a risky situation, but Ron knew that there was no other way out of it unless someone appeared and helped him out. A miracle that would not happen, though, because no one seemed to be brave enough to face the three Dementors and Harry was still at Hogwarts doing teacher stuff. Already the three dark creatures were within twenty feet from the two, increasing the feeling of hopelessness that they felt and making the hold on the Patronus harder to keep.

Yet, the miracle that Ron had unconsciously wished for happened. It all started with a single snowflake landing on his outstretched hand, producing a very cold spot on his skin. It was soon followed by several others, glistening in the darkness as if they shined on their own, stark white against pure black. The malevolent cold receded from their bodies, taking with it the feeling of hopelessness and depression, leaving in its wake a different kind of cold.

With the Dementors' presence not affecting him anymore, Ron's mind cleared and he was able to better focus on his happy thoughts, resulting in his Patronus to become more intense. The little dog, which had been more of a wispy consistence solidified, becoming bright white with a faint azure outline.

Just like Harry's Patronus.

"Alright, I believe it's time we left," he whispered to a still dazed Sam at his side. The girl, he noticed, was rubbing at her arms and had a pained expression on her face. "Think you can walk by yourself?"

It took Sam several seconds to clear her mind from that bloodcurdling scream of pain that had echoed through her mind for what seemed an eternity. "I... I think so," she replied, hating how her voice was trembling. "But where do we go? We have two of them in front of us and one behind us..."

"Maybe we can..."

Anything that Ron was going to suggest was interrupted by the loud sound of shattering ice coming from behind their backs. It was so sudden that it made the two jumps in surprise, their hearts thundering in their chests as adrenaline raced through their bodies, preparing them for the mad run that they would have to do very soon.

With a flicker of his wand, Ron's Patronus moved closer to his legs, its white light shining onto the dark bundle laying a few feet at their back. The ugly body of a fourth Dementor greeted them, but this one was in different conditions than its brethren.

The most noticeable thing was that the dark creature was frozen solid. And that its head was not on its shoulders, but laying four feet to its left. Apparently, the Dementor had been flying high up into the air, had been frozen inside out and had lost its head when it impacted with the ground below, thus ending its life.

_'Run.'_

For a moment Sam stood still where she was, her head whipping around to see from where that voice had come. As much as she tried to peer past the darkness of the Dementors, however, she could see no one but Ron standing tall next to her with his wand firmly outstretched, his Patronus reflecting his will and ready to attack.

The next thing she knew was that a bright azure light the size of a soccer ball shot down from the heavens and impacted against the Dementor at their back with the force of a meteor. The effects, however, were completely different. While a piece of flaming rock would have pushed the dark creature to the ground creating a deep crater in the street, this energy exploded into a blinding white flash with a sound of cracking and sliding ice.

A moment later, the lone floating Dementor was encased into a large block of ice so clear that the foul beast could be seen within, frozen into an attempt of escaping its fate. Ron wasn't sure if the creature was still alive in there, but he wasn't one to look at a gift horse in the mouth. Seizing the opportunity, he grabbed Sam's arm and dragged her past the large block of frozen water, commanding his Patronus to stall the remaining Dementors.

A task that was surprisingly easy because the two dark creatures were reluctant in advancing, preferring to turn their eyeless head upwards to stare at the dark sky. They even ignored the little dog until it bit onto a strand of cloak and started to pull at it, successfully dragging around the Dementor connected to it. Ron and Sam would have found that sight amusing if they weren't too busy running for their lives.

As it was, the two ran into a side alleyway just past the large block of ice, their breaths echoing loudly against the buildings surrounding them. When they were several feet inside the new street, the sound of forming ice reached their ears, making them stop to look back at the way they came from.

There, at the crossing with the main road, a huge wall of ice was growing from the ground, reaching past the buildings and becoming several feet thick. With the Dementors' presence finally lifting completely from the street and with the lights returning, Ron felt a bit safer. He ceased his Patronus, but kept his wand at the ready.

 _'Run,'_   the voice paused and seemed to struggle to continue, as if it had troubles communicating. _'Banshee.'_

When those words filled her head once again, Sam looked around with wide eyes. As much as she wanted to know who the voice belonged to, it had sounded so urgent that she could not help but do its bidding. She reached up with one hand and grabbed Ron's left elbow to gain his attention.

"Ron," she whispered, not wanting to reveal her position to the wrong creature. "What's a banshee?"

If the Weasley boy had been pale before thanks to the Dementors' presence, now his skin gained a new shade of white. "Something that I don't want to tangle with..." he replied with shaking voice. He could face Dementors, the wrath of Horcruxes, dozens of Death Eaters and even dragons without problems, but banshees were out of his league. Not only because he had no experience in battling them, but also because the only way to kill them was to break their neck when they closed their eyes to scream.

You missed that chance, and you died the instant their killer screech reached your ears.

Turning away from the wall of ice, he started to jog down the street trying to be as silent as he could. Sam was right behind him, her eyes moving left and right, hoping to catch glimpse of this new dark creature before it could kill them or that the mysterious voice would tell her where to go.

Sam was jostled away from her task, however, when Ron grabbed her by the waist and dived inside one of the old, disused shops to their left. "Don't make a sound..." he whispered as he ducked behind the dusty counter. He had become paler and his hands refused to soften their hold onto both the girl and his wand. "It's out there..."

And indeed the dark creature appeared outside the window a few seconds later, its green-tinged face framed by floor length black hair peering through the glass in search of its prey. It didn't make any sound as it reached for the door with its skeletal-like hand, its long fingers scraping at the old, rotten wood, making Ron and Sam so tense that they would have broken if it was even possible.

With a loud, wet creak, the door was finally opened and the banshee stepped inside, its small black eyes scanning every corner of the forgotten shop. The dark creature stood there, immobile as a statue, its hair falling around the skeletal green face as it moved its head around from the left to the right and back again.

When the creature found nothing out of the ordinary at first glance, it shuffled closer to the counter, its bare feet pattering gently against the dusty, creaky floor boards. One hand reached forwards, curling on the opposite edge, the long fingers almost scraping against Ron's right temple and giving him the scare of his life. It was only thanks to his hard-won self-control that he didn't bolt upright screaming curses.

As it was now, his eyes and the violet ones belonging to Sam were watching the black claw-like nails in a frozen fascination of sort, too scared to do anything but hope that the banshee would just walk away without looking behind the counter.

_'Run.'_

The voice came back to fill her mind just before something heavy smashed against the dark creature, hurling it backwards and out into the street with an explosion of rotten wood and old, dirty glass.

"Let's go!" Sam wanted nothing more than to find from where that voice was coming from and to who it belonged to, but despite feeling it loud as if the owner was close by, she couldn't let such a chance get wasted because of a petty curiosity on her part. "Someone's distracting it! We have to leave before the banshee's attention is back onto us!"

Ron couldn't agree more with her idea of leaving their current location and the dark beast behind. "Quick!" he hissed urgently, grabbing Sam's wrist and leading her out, past the gaping hole that had been created in place of the door and narrowly missing another of those ice walls springing from the ground.

This one was different, though, because instead of being straight and smooth, it was growing chaotically, sharp edges digging into the surrounding buildings and cracking and upturning the pavement around the base. Still, as Sam and Ron cast a quick glance at it, the jagged ice was clear enough them to see the distorted figure of the banshee being hurled against the wall, creating spiderweb like cracks around it.

"Come on," Ron muttered, tugging the young witch with him down the street and away from the battle. Judging by the length of the dark lines spreading from the center of the impact, the strength put behind that had been tremendous. "Let's get out of here."

Sam nodded absently, her free hand clasping around the box containing her new wand. She had been so focused on staying alive that she had forgotten she was still holding onto it until that moment. "What was that?" she asked, her mind trying to process all the events she had been part of in the last half a hour or so and choosing, for the moment, to ignore the faint vibrations coming from the object she was holding.

The wizard shook his head as he shoved open the door to yet another dark shop and rushed past the counter to reach the room in the back, knowing he would find a hearth and Floo Powder. "I don't know," he explained, rushing to the corner and grabbing the small vase with a glittery powder at the bottom. It was enough only for a person. "And I don't plan to stick around to find out. Whatever it was, it was doing a number on that banshee. Wait till I tell this to Hermione..."

Using his wand to turn on fire what little wood had remained in the chimney after years of disuse, Ron tossed the remaining Floo Powder in the flames and let them turn a bright emerald green. "Go ahead," he urged, pushing Sam towards the magical fire. "Go to Hogwarts, Defense Against Dark Arts Professor's Office. Tell Harry what happened and that I'll be there soon."

The thundering of breaking ice coming from outside urged Sam to step into the green fire, turning around to look at Ron with worry. "Be careful, ok?" she asked, trying to ignore the shaking ground and the dust falling from the wooden planks overhead. It kind of felt like the building was going to crumble at any minute now.

Ron gave a quick, forced smile as he watched the young witch clearly state her destination. The emerald flames brightened and enlarged, engulfing her entire body only to shrink away a second later, leaving an empty fireplace in their wake. Once he was alone and the room was cast in the dim light of spent embers, he turned around to look towards the door. He was not sure why he felt compelled to do that, but once he did, he wished he had just Apparated the second Sam was safely within the Floo Network, directed to Hogwarts.

There, with the cloaked head almost touching the wooden ceiling, the Dementor seemed to size him up and down, probably ready to pounce on him and Kiss his soul out of his body. Still, Ron wasn't the same boy that was prone to panic attacks like in his younger years. Seasoned by a ruthless war that had nearly killed him and his two best friends, he raised his wand and charmed his Patronus into existence, letting it rest at his feet as a means of protection.

It wasn't needed, though, because the Dementor backed out of the door and simply disappeared, leaving a very confused Ron behind.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Harry had to admit that calming down a class of first years was not as easy as teaching a Patronus charm like he had done in his DA club. Once the kids had gone into a frenzied chattering sparked by the sudden appearance of a disheveled and soot covered Sam bursting out of his office, no amount of calls to attention seemed to deter their wild guesses.

It didn't help the fact that the young witch had stumbled towards him and had muttered half incoherently for a minute before regaining some sort of sanity, narrating to him about Dementors, ice walls, a banshee and a seemingly lost Ron.

Thank goodness this was the last class of the day and tomorrow the lessons were only in the morning...

After her frantic tale, Sam had taken to sitting on the steps leading up to his DADA office, a light brown blanket over her usual goth attire and a large bar of chocolate in her hands. She was shaking lightly, but seemed to improve really quickly.

"Do you think the Dementors will come here?"

The loud question posed by one of his students to another classmate brought Harry back to present time and his task of calming his class down. "No," he said loudly but calmly, glad that his sharp answer had gotten everyone's undivided attention. "After what happened last year, the school has set up a defensive charm against all dark creatures around the perimeter."

He wasn't going to say that if enough of those dark creatures attacked together at the same time, the barrier would collapse on itself. There was no need to scare the kids, and even if the remote possibility that a swarm of Dementors approached, the school staff was prepared to repel them with Patronus charms and set up new defenses in a matter of minutes.

"Alright, class," he called for attention once again, his hands clapping a couple of times for emphasis. When the kids finally stopped whispering again, he gave a reassuring smile to them. "You have ten minutes left until you are free for the rest of the day, so I want you all to open your book at chapter three and read about Trolls and their subspecies. I will ask questions tomorrow, so you might want to learn it."

There was a collective moan of displeasure quickly followed by the sound of opening books. Harry watched them for a moment, making sure everyone was focusing on the task he had given, before he turned around and crouched in front of Sam. She still looked shaken, but her skin had finally regained its normal color and her trembling had finally ceased.

"Are you feeling better?"

It was a stupid standard question, but it never failed in its task of starting a conversation that was not going to be pleasant in any way. He sat down next to her and, still keeping an eye on the class, crossed his arms over his knees to wait for an answer.

"I'm alright. It's just... Dementors are so horrible! All the happiness and hope gone... and that... horrible scream..." Sam took a bite of the chocolate and chewed on it, feeling the relief spread from her tongue to her back and then to her limbs, giving her a warm and tingling sensation for a couple of seconds.

"By eating all the happiness out of you, Dementors force you to revive your worst experiences," Harry explained, knowing full well what the foul creatures could do to someone. That Sam was left remembering a horrible scream despite her amnesia was not farfetched. "I'll try to teach you the Patronus charm when you develop your skills a bit more."

They remained in companionable silence for a few minutes until a loud coughing fit filtered through the closed door at the top of the stairs, sparking a new cacophony of whispers within the classroom. Knowing that he was not going to be able to regain control of the students, Harry stood up and clapped his hands once more, secretly glad that such a simple gesture from him could silence the kids. He doubted, however, that it would work all the same if he was not who he was.

"Alright," he said once every pair of eyes was on him. "Since it seems that we're not going to have a quiet time these last few minutes, you can go. But remember that tomorrow I'm going to question you about the Trolls, so you might want to read the third chapter."

As soon as he was done, the room emptied with such a speed that Harry was sure it could match his old Nimbus 2000 broom. No matter if he was in his fourth week of official teaching at Hogwarts, he would never stop being impressed at how quickly kids could evacuate through the door when it was the last hour of lesson of the day.

The silence, however, lasted only a few seconds before the door of his office creaked open, distracting him from the empty desks in the classroom and making him look up at his friend. Ron was covered in as much soot as Sam had been, but he looked calmer even if he seemed to be a bit out of breath.

"Sorry," he muttered, patting some of the ash off his clothes with one hand while the other held a bundle of dark brown rags. It was one foot long, as large as his arm and was slightly covered in frost. "It was not easy to find someone that was willing to open the door to let me use their fireplace. Not after what happened."

Harry nodded and followed his friend down the steps to stand in front of the teacher's desk, the half-frozen pack of cloths being placed in the middle. "Sam informed me, Ron," he said. His hand reached for the wand he always carried in the pocket of his light gray jacket and took it out, but didn't cast any spell yet. "Hermione should be here any minute now. Is this what I think it is?"

"Yes," Ron replied after collecting a nearby chair to sit on. "Ice walls, Harry. Springing up from the ground so fast that not even an Engorgement charm on Hagrid's pumpkins could ever achieve!"

As his friend spoke, Harry's hands slowly unraveled the bundle of cloths on the table, one layer at a time. Each rag was more frozen than the previous until the wizard had to break the cloths to access the object concealed within, marveling at how much cold the three inches long shard of ice was emitting. No wonder Ron had wrapped it in so many rags to carry it around...

Before he could comment on how much crystal-like the shard was, the door to the classroom creaked open and Hermione walked in, looking fairly flustered. "Certain people just don't know when to keep their mouth shut," she huffed, depositing a couple of books on a desk and walking up to her two friends. "I actually had to take a point away from every single student in my class!"

"Let me guess... Gryffindors and Slytherins started a fight again?" Ron asked with a raised eyebrow, knowing full well what kind of point the two houses' rivalry could reach. There was no denying that it had improved some during the new year, but bad habits always tended to die hard.

Hermione's reply was to throw her hands up in the air with another angered huff. "Sometimes they are just impossible to deal with! I should know, though, but still..." she trailed off, deciding to focus on the problem at hand rather than her last hour of class with the fourth year students.

After Alecto Carrow's death, Hogwarts had ended up missing its Muggle Studies' professor. The newly addressed headmistress had looked left and right for one, but in the end she had been forced to ask Hermione to fill in for the year just like she had done with Harry. Most of the time she loved teaching to a class full of kids. Sometimes, however, she wished she could strangle them all one by one with her own hands...

"So, Ron," Hermione glanced up at her boyfriend with expectant eyes. The message she had gotten from Harry had given her a quick overview of the happenings in Diagon Alley, but it was far from the full, detailed story she wanted to hear. "Tell us."

The red headed wizard vaguely motioned at the ice crystal with his hand before leaning against the back of the chair with a deep sigh, giving a quick, but in-depth explanation of the attack. From the Dementors appearing to the moment he and Sam saw the banshee being thrown around like a rag doll. "There is one thing that doesn't make sense though," he added at the end of his tale. "When Sam was in the Floo Network, a Dementor cornered me, but it didn't attack. It looked at me for a moment before leaving..."

"Strange..." Harry mused, knowing that the dark creatures would attack every single chance they got no matter what kind of orders they were carrying out. That one of them left Ron alone without a fight was making alarm bells go off in his mind. It was a small detail that he felt was important and that was giving a weird feeling of deja-vu. Past experiences were telling him that, despite looking unimportant, it was far from it.

Taking a chair for herself, Hermione sat at the desk opposite Ron, leaving Harry the only one to be standing. She took out her wand and let it hover above the shard of ice, examining it with her magic. "It's not from a spell," she murmured after a couple of minutes, frowning in confusion. "There is no magic in it, but it's full of energy that's keeping the ice from melting."

While the trio examined the sliver of frozen water, Sam huddled on herself after finishing the chocolate Harry had kindly provided her with. She was tired and a bit sore, not to mention that she couldn't get rid of the echoes of that scream that the Dementor's presence had evoked in her mind. Long, bloodcurdling and so loud that her ears hurt despite it being only a memory.

Her violet eyes looked down at her left hand at the package she was still holding. The wrapping was torn and blackened in a few spots, revealing the box underneath. Thankfully, the cardboard had resisted the damage and had protected the wand within.

"Winter Spirit Hair, uh?" she asked to herself in a whisper, unheard by the discussing trio standing a couple of meters from her. If she focused enough, she could feel the faint presence of the ebony marvel within, calling to her and yearning to be held in her hands. It was a peculiar feeling that prompted her to unwrap the box and open it.

Once the wand was exposed, Sam lifted it to her eyes and stared at the dark wood intently. Mr Ollivander had done an exceptional work with it and she felt the sudden urge to practice with what felt like a trusty companion. It was really similar to the feeling she got when she first touched it, when the core had reached for her magic and had transformed itself, calling her name.

" _Confringo!"_

The loud explosion that split in half the teacher's desk and sent it in two different directions jostled Sam awake from her reverie, making her stand up and turn around to observe the trio with a mixture of annoyance and confusion.

"Wow," Ron exclaimed as he glanced at the mess Harry had just done with the Blasting Curse. The stone ground between their feet presented a large, circular black mark, with some dying tongues of bright orange flames around it. In the middle, the shard of ice looked perfectly intact. "No effects..."

Hermione crouched down and used her wand to prod the sliver. "I wouldn't say that," she said, quickly memorizing the information she was gaining from this experience. "It's not freezing stuff anymore."

To make her point, she replaced her wand into her pocket and grabbed the piece of ice with her bare fingers. It was still cold, but as she had noticed, it wasn't freezing her flesh like it had done with the rags. She stood up and held the frozen water up to eye-level, examining it while a small drop of water ran down her hand.

"It looks like the spell drained it of its energy," she continued, transferring the ice from her fingers to the open palm of her other hand for the others to see. Clear and smooth as before, now the surface presented a thin layer of water. "Now it's just like normal ice."

Harry placed a finger on the surface and increasingly applied pressure until the shard gave in with a sharp crack, breaking in half. Everyone remained silent, observing how quickly the ice was melting into a puddle of cold water in Hermione's hand before escaping to the charred floor.

"That reminds me of what Mr Ollivander said..."

The trio turned around to look at Sam. She was at the bottom of the steps, with the blanket loosely draped around her shoulders and looking intently at the wand she was holding in her right hand. Then her violet eyes turned onto Ron and waved the elegant wood into the air.

"Remember what he said?" she asked, a somewhat playful smile on her lips. "So cold that even Dementors would fear it."

After Sam resumed pondering to herself, Hermione and Harry zeroes onto their friend so quickly that the red headed Auror wondered how their neck survived the motion. For a moment he even thought that the two would transform into Dementors themselves for how much they seemed to loom darkly over him.

"Explain. Now."

The poor boy cringed at how curtly Hermione sounded with her demand and raised his hands to placate the two before they started to lecture him for forgetting something that was potentially important. "Well, it's something weird, so bear with me until I finish, ok?"

When the two raised their eyebrows in confusion and amusement, Ron sighed deeply. "I'll tell you the shortened version of the story," he mumbled before clearing his throat loudly and vaguely motioning towards Sam. "Although after what happened in Diagon Alley, I really think it's not so random as I thought it was when I heard it..."

Without hesitating, Ron started to recount what Garrick Ollivander had told him and Sam, trying to not leaving out any detail despite shortening the old wandmaker's tale of how he had gotten the core for the girl's wand. As he spoke, he watched how both Harry and Hermione became entrapped by the strange story until they were left quiet and pensive.

"There is something else too," Sam's voice was very quiet, but it echoed into the room in a way that it felt loud and the Golden Trio was roughly brought back to reality. They turned around to look at Sam with questions lingering on their closed lips, but refraining from speaking them in fear that the girl would shut up. She looked so reluctant already that it was a wonder she had ventured on telling them what was on her mind. "This is something really hard for me to tell you. It feels... really personal for some reason. But I own you for taking the job of protecting me."

She grabbed the blanket off her shoulders and deposited it on a chair near the wall, then walked to where the trio was standing. Her eyes never left the wand in her hand, as if it was some sort of anchor she could use to muster the courage to say what was needed to be said. It was not easy, though, because there was a sudden lump in her throat that tried to block her voice and keep what she knew a secret.

"Since the moment I touched this wand," she continued, her voice so low and shaky that the others had to lean in to hear what she was saying. "I... I'm hearing a voice. In my head. It's what warned me of the banshee's presence and told me when to run..."

When the secret was out, Sam felt relieved. The lump was gone and she was able to lift her eyes to look at the two wizards and one witch. Harry was so deeply in thought that he completely missed Hermione's and Ron's stares switching from him and the younger girl a few times before they looked at each other, a silent conversation suddenly taking place.

"You're not a Parselmouth, right?" Harry's question snapped his two friends out of their conjoined musing and three pair of differently colored eyes gazed into Sam's violet ones, waiting for her answer. "You know... talking to snakes..." he eventually explained as the girl looked more confused by the second.

They remained in silence for several minutes, none of them realizing that time was passing, until Ron's stomach loudly proclaimed that it was almost time for dinner. Hermione became outraged at the interruption, Harry stared at his best friend in surprise and Sam raised an eyebrow in amusement.

"I don't know if I can speak with snakes," the younger girl eventually replied, stifling a laugh upon seeing how Ron's reddening face became one with his hair. "But whatever it was, it helped me so I won't try to get rid of this voice. I... I trust him."

Finally succumbing to the emotion of amusement, Sam gave a wide smile to the red faced wizard and patted his back a couple of times before leaving the room, knowing that there was nothing else she could say or learn that day. And truth to be told, although she was recovering from the tiredness, she was hungry too.

As she made her way through the quiet hallways of the school, directed towards the mess hall, Sam's pocketed her wand and let her fingers brush over its smooth surface. Perhaps she was being a bit obsessive with it, but its presence felt so familiar and comforting that she couldn't help it.

With her mind getting lost within her own thoughts, Sam never realized that she was being stalked through the corridor until it was too late. With a loud splash, a hollow clattering of metal and obnoxious laughs, she found herself covered head to toe in putrid water. The bucket that contained it was lying at her feet while Peeves, the resident poltergeist, found great enjoyment on her misfortune.

Her left eye twitched spasmodically and her lips curled downwards in a grimace, her left hand moving up to bring her wet hair behind her ears so she could see. Unfortunately, being able to see did not help her.

The corridor she was in was filled with students, clustered in small groups and having a range of reactions that went from cringing to snickering as they all looked at her standing in the middle of a large, dark colored, smelling puddle with Peeves hovering above her.

Patience finally wearing out, Sam silently grabbed the metallic bucket and looked up at the poltergeist. He was still laughing, head thrown back and arm outstretched to point at her.

"Never take off your eyes from your enemy..." Sam whispered, her frown turning into a devious, scary smile. She might have lost her memories, but she found that the mere idea of exacting rightful justice on a pesky and annoying poltergeist was something that she greatly enjoyed.

Slowly bringing her arm back, and careful to not let the handle creak, she aimed for Peeves and threw the bucket as strongly as she could. The metallic contained sailed silently through the air until it landed against the exposed white-skinned chin of the poltergeist, rebounding upwards, knocking off his outlandish hat and resting upturned on his head.

The silence that filled the hallway in that moment would have been absolute if it weren't for the rhythmical sound of water droplets hitting the wet ground. Then, just as the staring crowd started whispering, Peeves grabbed the front of the bucket and lifted it enough so that his small eyes poked out from under it. He and Sam entered into a staring contest. Him floating in the air with an expression of surprise and her with one of amusement.

"So," the girl started, crossing her arms and regarding the poltergeist with a smile. "Do you like your own treatment?"

Peeves looked down at his clothes. They weren't as wet as Sam's, but they weren't exactly tidy either. "You..." he started, only to open and close his mouth like a fish out of water for several long seconds. "It's war!"

Feeling a sudden fire light itself up from within her body, Sam grabbed the first thing she could use as weapon that didn't belong to another student. A mop that had previously accompanied the bucket holding the smelling water, its dark gray head sending water droplets everywhere with every movement.

"Bring it on!"

Sam was the first to act by lunging forwards, mop outstretched forwards and to land it right on the Peeves's face. She twisted it around a bit, earning a loud yelp from the unprepared poltergeist, then backed away a couple of feet and stood at the ready as if she was holding a sword and not a simple mop. "I'm not your typical student, Peeves," the girl informed her opponent. "Expect me to fight back."

The poltergeist stared for a second, then puffed his cheeks in outrage. There was no way that he, resident prankster and troublemaker with as many years as the school itself, was going to lose to a mortal witch. Steeling himself, he pinpointed a worn broom to his left and scooped it with his nimble hands, going to hover a few inches from the ground in front of Sam.

He gave a mischievous and dangerous smile, the bucket on his head acting as a protective helmet. He twirled the broom once before he swung it at his opponent in a horizontal slash from the right side with as much strength as he had.

Only to be parried by the mop Sam was holding.

The two remained like that for a few seconds, with the girl smiling in amusement at Peeves's surprise. "Told you I was going to fight back," she whispered, pushing against the broom for a moment before stepping back and swinging her unconventional weapon in a diagonal motion.

The mop traveled through the air quickly, the drenched head sending forward an arch of dark water, and met with Peeves's broom midway with a loud sound of wood against wood. The two struggled again to overpower the other and their eyes locked.

Then, for some reason, the anger and annoyance disappeared from the poltergeist's eyes and he gave a wide grin as he recognized the girl to be someone he could really have fun with. Not with just normal hit and run pranks that would give him just a temporary fun. With her, he would have to work extra hard, plan the prank in every detail and be careful that she did not catch him before his idea was ready. It was a challenge that brought him new vigor and a genuine feeling of actually looking forwards to the next time he clashed with her. Instantly, his mischievous mind started to ponder at different plans as he parried, evaded and counterattacked in that strange fight that he came to enjoy.

"What's happening here?" A familiar voice asked as the owner tried to wade his way through the growing sea of curious students lingering at the ends of the corridor. "It's almost dinner time, you sho-"

As Ron finally reached the front of the mob, he was greeted by a mouthful of dirty, smelly mop. He heard something that sounded like 'sorry' coming from several feet in front of him just as he sailed backwards with arms flailing wildly, unbalanced by both the unexpected blow and the horrid stench pervading his nostrils.

When he looked up to see what had happened, though, whoever had attacked him with the cleaning tool had already disappeared down a flight of stairs to the left, screaming something about the fight not having ended.

Deciding that his sanity was more important than a mop wielding student and that it was not his job to keep them in line, Ron stood up, wiped some of the smelly water off his face, and directed himself towards the mess hall, knowing that Harry and Hermione would be there soon when they were done with their teacher stuff.

 


	4. Chapter 4

After that day of middle September where she had been attacked by dark creatures in the streets of Diagon Alley, Sam found the rest of the month and half of October to be rather uneventful. The days were mostly filled with hours of lessons and independent study, and when she wasn't busy with that, she had to deal with Peeves and his increasingly complex tricks and traps.

At first she had enjoyed the quick pace she had taken, but after a month she had become annoyed and restless, as if she was missing something important. She knew that it wasn't the progress in learning magic, after all, with Professor Granger and Professor Potter she was quickly catching up to the rest of the students of her age, nor it was the lack of action. Peeves was seeing to that.

Sam was not entirely sure about it, but she was starting to believe that what she was missing was a presence. And now, on the morning two weeks from the Halloween Feast, that feeling was gradually increasing to the point that it was distracting her from getting anything done.

With a deep sigh to try and calm her nerves down, she took a seat at the middle right table, near the end that was closest to the one the professors used. She wasn't exactly keen to be so close to the figures of authority of the school, but she understood how Ron, Hermione and Harry needed to keep an eye on her and be close enough to easily reach her if she was attacked again.

Because of the new rule the school board had created after the end of the Second Wizardry War where the houses were encouraged to mingle during meals to strengthen their bond, Sam, a Ravenclaw member, ended up sitting next to a Hufflepuff boy and in front of two Griffindor girls. The rest of the table was like that. A mix of reds, yellow and blue. There were a couple of green specks, but most of the Slytherins still seemed to enjoy the old ways and kept to themselves on their table.

After politely returning the greetings directed at her, Sam looked down at her empty plate and let herself get lost in her thoughts. Instantly, her mind wandered to the voice she had heard on that September day, wishing that it would come back to her, even if only to say hi. Perhaps it was stupid of her to want that, especially since whoever the voice belonged to didn't appear to her during that time, but her heart desperately wanted to see that creature.

"Maybe it's that..." she muttered to herself, her right hand reaching into her pocket to take out her wand. After a lot of thinking it through, she had come to the conclusion that the hairs that composed the core of her magic tool and the voice belonged to the same creature, and that said creature had spoken to her through her wand. In the end, everything was connected together in a way or in another. "Maybe it's his presence that I'm missing?"

It was weird, however, to be craving for the companionship of a creature, or 'spirit' as Mr Ollivander had called it, that she had never seen, heard of or that she couldn't even remember because of her amnesia. Unconsciously, her fingers started to rub the smooth surface of the ebony wood, as if trying to coax the wand into helping her reach for the owner of the voice so that she could speak to him.

Her thoughts, however, were interrupted when a loud crack filled the room, louder than the chattering of the students eating breakfast. Everyone, including the teachers, looked towards the source standing near the door that led to the small side room that was located near the professors' table.

There, covered in white snow, with frost clinging on his rag and shivering like a leaf in a storm, stood Kreacher. He was holding tightly on a book with his thin arms and looked ready to collapse, but his devotion to his master and his will to complete whatever task he had been given overpowered his tiredness.

"Harry Potter, Sir..." the house elf whispered, his voice strangely audible in the suddenly silent Great Hall. He took a couple of unsteady steps towards the table Harry was sitting at, then straightened up and tried to look presentable as he offered the book to his master. "Kreacher is a good house elf. Kreacher found the book..."

It took a lot of willpower for Harry to not rush to the shivering Kreacher and cover him with his jacket, knowing that the elf would feel more insulted by receiving a clothing than be grateful. Instead, he calmly stood up and knelt in front of Kreacher, taking the offered large book in his own hands.

"Are you alright, Kreacher?" at least Harry could make sure of his house elf's welfare by asking. That would really make the little creature really happy. "You're... shivering so badly... and covered in ice..?"

As expected, Kreacher's eyes widened and became filled with gratefulness and adoration. "Kreacher is good, Sir!" he exclaimed, his bullfrog-like voice gaining a volume that was previously thought impossible to achieve because of his conditions. "Kreacher is cold. But ice is what saved Kreacher from dark creatures."

At the mere mention of dark creatures, the Great Hall seemed to fall into a deeper silence than the one it experienced when the house elf had apparated. No one dared to move a muscle, nor wished to whisper their thoughts to the student sitting next to them.

"Winter, Sir," Kreacher continued, completely obvious of the large audience he had gained, his eyes resting only on his master. Harry could see how the elf's large orbs were gaining that dreamlike light when someone thought fondly of something that had happened in their past. "Winter came with ice and cold. Winter is pure. Winter protected Kreacher and helped Kreacher escape so that Kreacher could bring book to master Potter!"

Ron, being his usual self, looked out of a window with a frown. " _ Winter _ _?_ " he asked in confusion, returning his eyes onto the still shivering house elf. He seemed to get warmer, though, because his shivers had lessened and his skin was regaining some color. "We're not even at the end of October. Winter doesn't start until past middle December!"

Kreacher shook his head wildly, his ears flapping everywhere. "Not winter season," he replied, almost stomping his small foot on the floor for emphasis. "Winter. Powerful spirit Winter is. Commands ice and cold as Winter wishes."

Harry brought a hand to his face and rubbed his eyes. "Wait... you said 'spirit', right?" as Kreacher nodded his head, the wizard sighed and patted the house elf's shoulder. "Alright, I got it. Thanks for getting me this book, Kreacher. Now you go and get yourself dry and warm, and take the day off if you feel tired."

If possible, Kreacher's eyes became wider than before and small tears of joy appeared at their corners. "Harry Potter is good master! Kreacher is lucky to have master Potter as master!"

After a grateful-filled smile, the old house elf raised his right hand and snapped his fingers, disapparating out of the Great Hall and leaving it in total silence. Harry wasn't worrying about it, but when he stood up and cast his eyes around, he gave a deep sigh of disgruntlement. "Alright," he called out to everyone. "Show is over. Go back to your breakfast and read your mail before lessons start!"

While the Great Hall exploded into a bustle of excitement, curiosity and the need to feed before the food disappeared from the plates, Harry turned around and sat back at the table with yet another sigh. His current position put him between Hermione and the headmistress McGonagall. Ron was sitting next to his girlfriend and that disposition made talking much easier.

"Mister Potter," Minerva spoke in a soft tone of voice, wanting to avoid dragging the attention of the already excited students back to them. "Would you care to explain what that was all about?"

For a single moment Harry felt like he was the proverbial deer caught by the headlights of a car during a dark night, then he forced himself to remember that not only he was part of the Hogwarts's staff, but that Minerva McGonagall was a powerful witch that was worth being trusted with their current problem. After all, she had been the one that had decided to shelter the amnesiac American girl despite knowing that the dark creatures were after her.

"Well, Professor," Hermione came in to save Harry from an awkward moment. "Back in September, when I heard of the story behind Sam Manson's wand and how she and Ron survived an attack from some Dementors and a banshee, I started researching a few things in the library during my spare time."

Harry and Ron quickly nodded their heads, silently confirming their friend's tale to be true. After that day in September, all the spare time Hermione could get was spent in the library of Hogwarts amongst piles of books and scrolls that not even the two wizards knew the existence of. They had tried to help her out a few times, but in the end they had done more of a mess than anything else and had decided to leave the research to the girl.

Hermione made a small motion with her hand to indicate Sam still sitting at the table, deep in her own thoughts while looking intently at her wand. "Mr Ollivander called it 'Winter Spirit Hair'," she explained, referring to the unique core the American witch had received. "Then Ron told us about the ice that literally grew out of the ground and how Dementors were being frozen to death, and now Kreacher, telling us about this Winter Spirit saving him."

Minerva nodded her head, her green eyes narrowing in understanding. "I can see the pattern, Miss Granger," she said, nodding her head in a clear sign for the girl to continue her tale. She had troubles believing in a spirit so powerful that it could control ice to that extent. After all, ghosts couldn't physically interact with the mortal world and poltergeists, despite their ability to touch things, couldn't conjure the simplest of magic.

This was absurd and it was slowly bringing back that awful headache she had encountered when she had first heard of Samantha Manson from Kingsley. Still, she could not deny that there could be a small chance that what everyone was saying about this creature being a spirit of some sort was true. After all, magic was a world that was still being discovered despite wizards and witches knowing a lot about it.

"I've been looking into spirits," Hermione continued, grabbing the book from Harry's hands and leafing through it with gentle care, not wanting to tear the old pages. "But there isn't much. Only the basic of stuff like ghosts being the imprint left by the departing soul of a wizard or witch and poltergeists being indestructible spirit of chaos. A couple of books ventured in describing their... ah... 'abilities', but still, nothing more than basic info. That is, until a book made a note about the wrong facts that Miss Joan Prentice wrote in  _ her  _ book."

Four pair of eyes looked down at the tome Hermione had opened in front of her. Now that they were observing it better, they noticed that the pages had a yellow tone to them and were torn at the edges while the left bottom corner of the leather cover was burnt and almost falling off. The book, as a whole, looked like it had been considered a blasphemy when it had been written, had gone through a fire and had survived by miracle.

"The world is full of legends about spirits, creatures or gods that can control their environment," Hermione continued, almost caressing the pages in eagerness to read and translate the handwritten runes. "Some really famous, some nearly forgotten. Perhaps they are just stories, but a lot of stories have a truth hidden deep within them. Just like The Tale of the Three Brothers."

The witch then started to read the book silently, her head bending down and her hair almost cascading around her eyes like a personal curtain to block the rest of the world while she focused on translating the text. She was only at the beginning of the book, but already her face was expressing understanding and wonderment as the new information somewhat clicked together with the facts she already knew to form a bigger picture.

Knowing that she wouldn't come back to reality easily, Harry returned to his meal with a sigh, hoping to get a simplified version later in the day, or week. His eyes moved around the room, observing how the students had resumed a semblance of normality despite the eventful morning. Still, he knew that he was going to have a hard time keeping his classes on topic.

His gaze then moved to the headmistress next to him. She had resumed eating her meal, but just like him and Ron, she was deeply in thought, trying to make sense of the new information they had been granted with that, if true, would surely throw the magical world into more chaos.

"I don't think that even the ghosts of Hogwarts know this stuff," he heard Hermione mutter to herself as she turned yet another page. It was really impressive how well she had learned the runes to the point she could read them fluently. "And no wonder this stuff was though as if it was blasphemy..."

On her other side, Ron was being torn between his curiosity about what Hermione was reading and totally ignoring her until she had a simpler version of the story to relate them. His eyes darted between her bowed head and Sam sitting at the table until a sudden thought seemed to strike his mind and clear the storm of confusion clouding his better judgment.

"Wait," he said loudly enough to attract the attention of the teachers surrounding him, Harry, Hermione and Minerva included. They looked at him in curiosity, pausing in what they were doing and waiting for whatever he was going to say. "Winter Spirit... you don't think it's Jack Frost, do you?"

Time seemed to freeze, Hermione looked at Ron with a blank stare. Harry raised an eyebrow as if to silently convey the message of 'what the heck are you talking about?' and Professor McGonagall was ready to call it quits and hole herself up in her room with a large pack of ice on her head and a few bottles of whatever potion Madam Pomfrey could supply for her blossoming headache.

Then Hermione mercifully ended the moment by glaring at Ron. "And what makes you think that, out of all the spirits of known stories and legends, it is Jack Frost?"

The red headed wizard shrugged helplessly, hoping that his next words would not send the girl into a verbal fit of some sort. "Well, you said it yourself. This spirit is connected to ice and winter, and from what I remember of the story of Jack Frost, he is a spirit of winter. Besides, it's the only story of this kind that I know of."

There was another moment of staring, then Hermione had to actually mull over what he had said and suddenly she could find that she couldn't deny what he had just said. "Well..." she started, unsure. "I... I don't know..."

Yet, as the thought continued to swim through her mind, the witch couldn't help but feel as if there was some sort of connection between the fabled character, the present Winter Spirit and, perhaps, even other creatures of ice and snow from the stories from around the world. Then she remembered her own words, the ones saying that every story had a truth behind them, and she felt like there was a really big truth behind all this spiritual stuff that the wizardry community had chose to consider wrong and blatantly ignore and that needed to be discovered.

"Ron, you're brilliant," she said after a while, closing the book and observing the title etched in gold on the leather cover. _Spirits and Their Realm, by Joan Prentice_ it read. Ron's comment on the legend of Jack Frost had sent her thoughts into a direction that she had no idea where it would take her, but that it felt right. "I need to read this book, all of it. For now, however, we'll call this spirit as Kreacher called it. Winter. Just to keep him separated from the stories."

And then she was off, trotting down the Great Hall with the book in her hands and with her hair floating behind her just before she disappeared out of the large doors, leaving everyone more confused than before.

Only to be closely followed by Sam, who had decided that an apple was enough for her breakfast. She looked confused, but at the same time she was determined to find out what was happening around her. It was a look that Harry and Ron both knew very well, having seen it firmly planted several times on each other faces.

"I better follow her," the red headed wizard said as he stood up, grabbing a pastry out of the tray and launching a wistful glance at the rest sitting there innocently and waiting to be eaten. "Before she gets into troubles with Peeves..."

Not that she couldn't defend herself. Even without magic Sam had shown to the whole school that she was perfectly capable of fending off whatever the poltergeist threw at her at any given moment, going as far as being able to predict where he put his traps around the school. She was so good that students and professors alike started to wonder what kind of poltergeist activity was going on in that forgotten land that was Amity Park and its surroundings.

Not that these rumors annoyed the girl. She was often too busy with her own schedule to pay any attention to the whispering done behind her back. Nor did she care that people knew of her connection with this supposedly spirit of winter. All she wanted to do was to find the truth.

And boy if she was going to find it.

She was tired of sitting back and doing nothing but study. She was tired of letting others take care of her and defend her from those awful dark creatures that hunted her down like an animal without her knowing the reason. And she was tired of waiting for a voice to come back only when she was in need of help.

Instead of following the path that would take her to the classroom of her first lesson, potions in the dungeons, she took a left turn and then a right, went down a flight of stairs and walked out in the front yard. At the moment it was empty of students, but the large monument in its center filled up the small, empty space.

The monument itself was beautiful in her eyes. It was composed of a large tree, magically grown to adulthood, that had its roots curling around a giant slab of stone with all the names of those who had fallen during the Second Wizardry War while its long branches spread over the entire yard. The whole thing stood in the middle of a large basin filled with crystal clear water. Right now the tree was naked of its leaves, but during spring and summer it was bound to be a sight to behold.

It was in that place that she sat, at the edge of the fountain and looking intently at her reflection in the water. It felt peaceful there, and the branches spreading over her head like the web of a spider gave her a sense of protection. "I believe it's time for me to take things into my own hands," she whispered to the reflected image as if it was another person. "I'm not sure what I should do, but... that's not going to stop me."

With those words, Sam turned to sit with her back to the water and closed her eyes. She carefully took her wand out from her pocket and let it rest on her lap, mind focusing solely on it while the rest of the world disappeared from her senses. If the spirit had been able to talk to her with the wand as some sort of phone, then she probably could do the same, and it didn't matter how much time or energy it would take, she was going to have a talk with him.

Then, as she focused deeper and deeper into the familiar power coming from her wand, the springtime air that came from it slowly cooled until it was replaced by the crisp whisper of winter. There was an initial moment of confusion and alarm, only to be replaced by recognition, happiness and longing a second later.

Unconsciously, Sam licked her lips and took a deep breath. The connection had been made, but it was shaky and weak. It was taking her a lot of energy to keep it and it felt that the magical phone call could break at the smallest of the distractions. Still, she could not lose this golden opportunity and poured more of her magic into what she was doing.

"Hello..?" she said tentatively, her voice a mere whisper leaving her lips. "Can you hear me?"

Seconds passed in silence and Sam was beginning to believe that all the link could do was to let her transmit only her emotions. That is, until the spirit seemed to press further into her own consciousness with his own. It felt cold and powerful, but at the same time gentle and caring.

_ Run. _

It was simple and direct. A command to be followed without protesting that left Sam bewildered. There she was, spending a lot of her energy to speak with this magical creature and all he told her was to run. She remained silent for a moment, then scrunched her face into a frown and felt anger pervade her mind, almost breaking the feeble connection.

"Why would I run?" she asked a bit miffed, her voice a bit above the whispering tone she had first used. "Hogwarts is a safe place. The shield keeps any kind of dark creature out of the perimeter!"

There was more silence and Sam felt like the spirit on the other end was having a lot of troubles communicating with her. Not because he didn't know how to speak her language, but because it took a lot of effort, energy and concentration on his part. Far more than she was doing at the moment.

_Dragon..._ the voice was barely a whisper now, distant and tired. _Ghost..._

After those two words, there was an agony filled scream that rang through her mind just before the connection between her and the spirit was broken. Sam remained sitting where she was for a moment, dizzy, confused and scared, then she stood up and ran back inside, almost colliding with Ron as he made his way outside.

The girl looked up at her bodyguard and grabbed him by the front of his jacket. "Please," she said, feeling frantic by the second. "Please tell me that Hogwarts is protected from dragons, ghosts or something that's both!"

Ron's paling face told her that, no, the school was not protected by those particular creatures.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the life of me, I can't fully remember why I chose "Joan Prentice" as the author of that book Hermione wanted. I know that she was a real person, and that she was believed to have something to do with spirits/familiars, although I can't find the same page I used once for information. Back in the day this was somewhat important, now... this particular tidbit is shrouded by the mists of Forgetland.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And with this chapter, written years after the previous one, marks my return to this fic. Next chapter fairly soon, hopefully.

As the dragon flew over the school in large, lazy circles, Harry realized that it was a breed he had never read of. He knew he was in no way an expert, that he barely scratched the surface of this vast knowledge, but he _had_ taken the time to browse through all the existing sub-races after the end of his fight with Voldemort.

And even if he had just skimmed them in a way that would have made Hermione scream in a frantic panic about his lacking skills on studying, he was pretty sure he would remember something as peculiar as the thing stalking the school from the air as if it owned the place.

Its look and behavior weren't matching with regular dragons at all.

Normally, a dragon would roar, spit fire and generally make its presence known just to declare its territory. It would attack anything that moved and remotely resembled a human being. It would land, then just spit more fire until all that was left was an empty castle.

That or just turn around and go somewhere else in search of a better perch for less troubles that a bunch of wizards and witches could provide. As it was, however, this dragon kept circling. Harry counted at least twelves laps from the moment he rushed out in the courtyard to face it, yet the clearly massive beast seemed intent on stalling for time.

“Harry...” Ron whispered from just behind his back, hissing in the same way he had done years ago when his best friend was too busy talking to the giant spider to notice the other giant spiders crawling all around them.

Harry sighed, not letting his eyes stray away from the dragon that just started its thirteenth lap. “Ron, just... just be ready, ok? I fought a dragon before. We _rode_ a dragon to freedom too, remember? It... it can't be _hard_!”

Despite his self assurance, however, Harry was far from being sure that he could do something. Not when the dragon was still up in the air and he didn't dare to fire at it in fear of making it angry. So far, he was content in letting it fly around. The slower it took to start attacking, the more time the other professors had to strengthen the barriers and wards around the Great Hall where the students had been forced to stay.

By the time Harry counted the fifteenth lap in his mind, the dragon took a sharp turn and started its descent in a slow, almost lazy, glide. The black blob that had previously flew over the tall towers became larger and larger as it neared the ground, and when it finally landed in front of the two, Harry realized just how _big_ it was.

The-boy-who-survived-way-too-many-things-to-count felt the familiar rush of adrenaline fill his veins. This was going to be another of those fights where he won by sheer miracle or he died a horrible, horrible death.

It reminded him of his first years at Hogwarts, where it was more dumb luck than true skills.

Now that he had experience, however, Harry moved as slowly as possible to reach the wand he kept in the pocket of his muggle jacket. He knew that he should probably not look directly at the dragon, but those intense red eyes were too much to ignore. They gave him the creeps and for once, perhaps it was best to not look somewhere else. Thankfully, the smoothness of the wood handle brushing against his fingers gave him a small confidence boost that he desperately needed.

The dragon remained where it was for a few long moments, then craned its neck high up into the air and snorted loudly. Harry, as stubborn as he was, ignored the little voice in the back of his head and stood rooted to the spot, observing with a keen eye how the black and purple scales gave off a very dull, greenish light that matched the color of its horns and claws.

“You are either a foolish mortal, or you are so blind as to not see defeat when it stands in front of you.”

The guttural voice shook the air, making Harry's blood freeze in his veins. A shiver ran down the boy's back and he was pretty sure he had heard Ron drop something to the ground. For the benefit of their lives, he hoped it was his jaw rather than his wand.

“Harry...” Ron whispered again, far more urgently than before. “The dragon. It _spoke.._!”

And for being a lizard with a very long neck and a lipless snout, it spoke really well. But Harry had no time to rationalize what was going on because the beast took a step forward and slammed a giant front paw to the ground, raising a thick cloud of dust.

“Give me the girl, and I shall leave without razing this place to the ground.”

The dust cloud settled, and to make sure it drove its point across to the two shaken wizards, the dragon dragged its green claws across the ground to dig deep marks in the hard terrain. Ron gulped at the motion and shivered at the idea of being the one torn to shreds.

“By girl... do you mean Samantha Manson?”

Harry was surprised at how he had just started negotiations with a talking dragon of all things. Still, he was fairly known to achieve what other, more sane, people thought as impossible. It was the main reason he had lived for so long, so he decided to roll with the situation and see where diplomacy could lead him.

“I see you are quick to understand,” the dragon replied, pleased at how fast things were progressing. “Yes, that is the girl I want to be brought to me. I, Prince Aragon, _demand_ it.”

While Ron was having an internal screaming match between the reality of the situation against what he was taught since he was a baby, Harry Potter felt like he was digging further down into his grave thanks to his stubbornness. He just hoped that by talking a bit longer it would give Hermione enough time to come up with something that could drive this talking dragon away.

“Well, Samantha Mansion is currently under Hogwarts' protection. We can't exactly give her away like this,” Harry really wished there was an interracial diplomacy course at the school because he felt like he was grasping at straws. “Can I ask why you want her?”

The dragon, now identified as a male thanks to his title, reared his head a little more and looked down at the young man in something akin surprise. It lasted for a few seconds before the huge beast lowered its neck so that he could glared into Harry's green eyes.

“That, little mortal,” he growled lowly, letting puff of azure smoke out of his nostrils with each word. “Is nothing of your interest. Hand the girl over, and I will let you live. Defy my will, and you will regret it for as long as I take to burn this place down with all your little friends inside before I kill you.”

Harry looked into the dragon's red eyes and realized that there was nothing more to say. “You have give me fair warning, Prince Aragon,” he replied as he took a step back. Just because they were enemies, he felt no need to be rude. Especially if the dragon was really a prince and there was a king somewhere. The last thing he wanted was to instigate another war not even a year after the last one. “Unfortunately, I can't hand her over without a valid motive.”

Whipping his want out with a draw so fast that it was almost blinding, Harry took a dive to the side just as the dragon launched a stream of azure flames that burned hotter than the sun. Behind him, just a few feet to his right, he felt Ron land with a loud huff and a curse that would make his mother furious.

Without wasting any more precious time, the two scrambled to their feet an ran in opposite directions in a well practiced tactic of keeping the enemy's attention divided between them. While Harry started to throw carelessly aimed spells at Aragon's head to gain his full focus, Ron crept behind the beast and took a few seconds to come up with a plan that wouldn't get both him and his best friend dead.

It was well known that a dragon's hide was impervious to most spells, even going so far as to rebound them in some cases, so they had to be extra careful. Thankfully, however, Ron's older brother worked with dragons, and the younger Weasley knew a thing or two on how to deal with them.

“ _Incarcerous!”_

As soon as Ron spoke the spell's name and made the right motions with his wand, several ropes appeared around the raging dragon. They crept around his body, briefly stilling him when they wrapped around his jaws and wings. There was a brief struggle as Aragon tried to maintain his balance and fight off the ropes, but then he faded into a state of semi transparency and the summoned bindings simply fell to the ground.

Right _through_ him.

Now with the dragon's attention onto him, Ron did the first thing he could think of. He dove to the side again, rolling onto the ground a couple of times, and fired a Blasting Curse at the earth right in front his enemy. The curtain of debris lifted by the impact was just in time to block another stream of infernally hot flames.

Harry, on the other side of the courtyard, had his hands in his hair in disbelief and frustration. Suddenly, Sam's claim of _'a dragon, a ghost, or something that's both'_ made perfectly sense. There was absolutely no way they could walk out of this fight in one piece without Hermione. She was the smart one, after all.

When the debris raised from Ron's spell settled down enough to see clearly, Aragon inhaled again and blew another slew of flames directed at Harry's best friend. Ron, for his part, was quick enough to throw up a Protego incantation to ward them off long enough to run out of the way and take refuge behind one of the many columns lining the covered walkways on the sides.

Aragon let out a growl of frustration and reared back his head with the clear intention of flooding the partially enclosed space with fire. Seeing that, Harry pointed his want at the dragon's head and prayed whoever was listening to him that the next spell would be just enough to distract the angry beast long enough for Ron to find somewhere else to take cover.

“ _Stupefy!_ ”

The red jet of magic flew from the tip of his wand to the back of Aragon's head in a direct line, impacting with enough strength to surprise the dragon and send his nose through one of the columns. Still, the spell wasn't enough to hurt him, and as soon as the shock wore off, Aragon stood back and turned his head to look at Harry with rage and hate.

“Do not think that your petty spells can harm me, mortals!” he roared, turning his whole body and lashing with his spiked tail at the stone archways where Ron was hiding. “You cannot stop me! By refusing my demand, you have doomed yourself! I will burn this place down until I find the girl!”

When the dragon's roars came to a halt, Harry bit his lip and clutched the wand in his hands while he hid behind the low wall separating the walkways from the courtyard. He had no idea what a dragon wanted with a girl, but he recognized evil intentions when he saw them.

“Prince Aragon!” Harry shouted when the dragon became distracted by a spell launched by Ron from the other side of the battlefield. “Perhaps you think of us as foolish, but you made a big mistake!”

The young man stood up and hopped over the low wall, wand pointed at the black dragon threateningly. Perhaps Aragon was impervious to most spells, but he and Ron were fighting in their home turf. They still had some advantage despite the horrible odds.

Green eyes met red and the two became locked in a battle of wills. Aragon snorted loudly, furious at being defied once again, while Harry prepared to fire the Stupefy Charm in rapid succession and not stop until the dragon toppled.

“No matter what,” the young professor yelled. “Hogwarts will always provide help to those who needs it!”

Harry ran to the left, hand starting the wand motion for Stupefy as the dragon's jaws opened wide. Azure flames collected at the base of his throat, becoming brighter and brighter as Aragon slowly reached the right temperature to breath them out.

Ron was still on the other side of the courtyard, partially hiding behind the memorial tree with his own wand trained at the giant lizard's head. He looked like he was getting ready to fire his own barrage of spells, hoping that the more hits Aragon took, the less likely they were bound to be burned to smoldering ashes.

Everything seemed to slow down to a crawl then, only to accelerate anew as the seconds passed. The battle returned to be a chaotic rush, with its loud sounds and terrifying moments. Adrenaline spiked and when the dragon finally breathed the jet of intense flames, the young DADA professor had already moved.

The patch of ground Harry had been moving through just a moment before became a mass of molten rock.

Without slowing down at all from his sprint, Harry aimed his wand towards the general direction of Aragon's head. As the first spell flew from the tip of his wand in a jet of red light, the famous wizard saw a grayish blur run through the courtyard's length. It wasn't exactly fast, but the dragon had been distracted long enough for him to not notice the approaching figure.

“ _Aragon!_ ”

The shout was louder than any roar the dragon had ever let out. It shook the air and the ground. Shook plaster and dirt from ceilings and walls. It penetrated into Harry's and and Ron's bodies to rattle their bones and lungs, echoing for several seconds even after the scream had stopped.

Aragon turned his massive body around, looking as shaken as the two wizards, and tried to get away from the cloaked figure by rearing on his hind legs in some sort of frenzied panic. His chest and belly were exposed, and as the small person took a leap towards him with outstretched arms, Harry became aware of a metallic glint of gold and green against purple scales.

Then the shiny glitter was taken away, carried to the other side of the courtyard by the mysterious figure. They skidded to a halt near the entrance doors to the castle, their ragged and dirty cloak flaring in its wake. They turned around, revealing the face of a boy partially hidden by a hood and a gold necklace firmly held in an outstretched hand.

A moment later Aragon  _the dragon_ was no more.

 


	6. Chapter 06

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for any errors, misspelling or wrong words. I have no beta reader and there is only so much I can do when it comes to correcting something.  
> (Also, this is the seventh version of this chapter, and if I don't get it out now it'll be the 14th before I come up with something good again.)

Despite the loss of his dragon form, Aragon's rage did not dwindle with his size at all. Harry could see it in his red eyes and fanged snarl, in his tense shoulders barely hidden by the frayed black cloak, and if that wasn't enough, he could also _perceive_ it.

He didn't know how he could do it. This was something he thought only sensitive magic folks or perhaps mystics could do. But Aragon's emotions were so strong and negative that he could feel them wash over his own skin like a slimy sludge of sort. It made him sick, and a large part of his instinct was screaming to just run far away and take a really hot bath with the kind of soap used for industrial washing machines.

And yet, the cloaked kid was unfazed by the invisible miasma coming from the prince in waves, merely crossing his arms and tilting his head a little to the side.

“Your ego is as big as always, Aragon...”

The boy's voice echoed strangely into the now frigid air, creating an illusion of empty corridors and silent breezes into Harry's mind. It was soft, but clear and seemed to resonate in his ears long after he stopped speaking.

“Yet...” the kid shook his head and the motion made the hood fall off, revealing white hair and shockingly green eyes. A green that was the same shade of the killing curse. “What did he offer you? Your kingdom? You know that the people you once ruled are now loyal to your sister. They will never follow you again, no matter how much you terrorize them with your power. It'll never work.”

Thanks to the jabbing words, Aragon was close to snapping in a violent way, and Harry slowly moved away from what was surely going to be a battleground. Even if he had turned into a 'human' when the amulet was taken from him, the prince seemed undeterred by the loss of his most powerful asset.

“You are merely an ignorant peasant,” Aragon replied, his voice quivering with barely repressed anger. “Unbefitting of being in the presence of a prince, let alone meddle with _my_ kingdom's affairs. I would destroy you if the deal I have made allowed me. As it is, I can only make sure you cannot interfere again.”

The harsh expression that overcame the boy's features as soon as Aragon stopped talking made Harry's blood freeze in his veins for a few precious moments, stopping him in where there was no cover at all. Then shaky fingers took him by the back of his jacket with an iron grip and forced him into a backward stumble, effectively breaking the icy sensation that had just overcome him.

Along the way he heard something about _toppling a king_ , but the rest of the words were lost the moment Ron pushed him past the huge doors of Hogwarts, slamming them closed as soon as they were securely inside.

“Harry..!”

Ron's voice sounded as strained as that time when they had visited Aragog, Hagrid's pet spider, and the wizard-that-saw-too-much-in-his-life found himself wondering exactly how he had gone from one end of the courtyard to the other without realizing more than just 'Ron dragging him'.

“Harry! That's..! That's the bloke with the ice powers!” Ron continued, his back pressing against the dark wood of the doors in an unconscious effort of making them stronger with his presence. “The one Hermione calls Winter!”

Harry shook his head and nearly jumped away when a loud boom resounded from the outside, shaking the very foundations of the ancient stone castle. “Who? Wait..! How can you know?!” he asked, his own voice starting to gain a strained edge to it. “You said you never saw him!”

The youngest Weasley shook his head vigorously and took several steps away from the door when it shook with the same violence of a leaf in a storm. He raised his arm, holding it still like a rock, and pointed the wand straight at the dark wood separating them from the outside, ready to cast any spell required to save their lives.

“No, yes, I mean!” Ron took a deep breath and stood straight up, forcing his body and mind to recover that control he had earned through years of battling dark creatures and mad wizards. “I never saw him, but... Harry... it's the same cold! The same feelings I got when Winter took down those Dementors in Diagon Alley with his growing ice!”

Truth was, Ron couldn't exactly explain what he had felt back then, nor what he was feeling now. It was like taking a walk outside during a winter morning, with snow everywhere and an icy breeze coming from the distant north. Just... _otherworldly_.

Another bang quickly followed by the cracking of ice shook the two out of their discussion, prompting them to cast a Protego spell over the creaking doors to enhance their durability. Even if they didn't know if it would prove effective, it was better than to just leave them be.

“Do you think the kid... Winter,” Harry said after a few seconds of unnerving silence. “Do you think he's alright out there?”

Ron scoffed, looking almost offended as his conviction of the spirit's powers was challenged. “He took down four Dementors and a Banshee in less than half a hour, Harry,” he replied quickly, almost offhandedly. “If he can do that, he can take care of this dragon bloke.”

More shattering ice, outcries of anger and something that sounded suspiciously like a part of the school crumbling to the ground stopped Harry from voicing his growing concern. Perhaps Winter could bring down Dementors and Banshees easily, but by what he could hear, Aragon was proving to be something else entirely.

“Ron, I think we should go out and help,” he said when the chaos outside seemed to take a pause, quietening to the point of unnerving stillness. “There must be a way to help Winter win this fight. If he can't take down Aragon, then how are we going to do it before he takes Sam?”

It was a valid concern, and Ron could see it as well.

“But Harry... how do we do it?” the red headed wizard voiced his own concern with a frown etched on his face. “How can we defeat this guy when he can just let our spells pass through him like he isn't even here?”

Harry opened his mouth to answer, but stopped when he realized he had no solution. There was no way for them to win if they couldn't even hit their enemy while he could easily retaliate the moment they were distracted.

“Use Aguamenti!”

Hermione's voice coming from behind their back made the two wizards turn on the spot so fast that they almost lost their balance. They had been so focused on the battle outside that they hadn't even heard her running footsteps, or when she came to an abrupt halt just a few feet from them.

“Use Aguamenti!” she repeated after a couple of heavy breaths, one hand going to tame her wild hair while the other rested against her side, probably to sedate a painful stitch in her muscles. “The moment the water hits Winter's ice, it will freeze over. Perhaps this can help him outsmart his enemy.”

While Ron made sure the girl wouldn't collapse to the ground in a heap because of the effort of running through the entire school, Harry's battle expertise took over the worry and doubt. In his mind thought after thought chased each other, depicting every single scenario of how he could use the water spell to gain the best outcome.

“I... I think I have something,” he called to Ron, one hand reaching for the wand he had replaced in his pocket sometimes after casting the Protego spell on the doors. “If Aragon is as busy with Winter as I believe he is right now...”

To emphasize his point, a loud explosion shook the castle's walls again, forcing the three to put their arms over their heads to shield themselves from falling dust and stone shards that had been undisturbed for centuries. A scream was next and Harry felt like they were running out of time.

“Alright,” he resumed speaking once things quieted down again. “I don't know where Aragon is right now, but if we can sneak behind his back unnoticed and hit him with Aguamenti... maybe Winter will have an opening. It's worth a shot.”

He was not really sure if Winter really needed help, or if they would only get in the way. _Or_ if the kind of ice coming from freezing a water spell would be able to stop the raging prince at all, but Harry had went through too much in the past to just sit down on the sidelines and wait for things to sort themselves out. It went against his nature of fighter.

Mustering his courage, however, was not as easy as it usually was. There was some sort of mental block that made him hesitate, and when Harry glanced at his friends, he realized that despite their determination to see this whole situation through, they were hesitating as much as he was.

Even Hermione, who had suggested the use of Aguamenti, looked reluctant on going out there without a clear knowledge of what kind of creature they were fighting against.

“Alright,” Harry repeated, feeling like he had a huge weight on his shoulders. “Alright! Let's do this---”

He was interrupted when the doors at his back exploded inwards, sending shards of wood and fragments of magic shield flying everywhere. It forced the trio to duck as low as possible, with their arms shooting up over their heads for protection and gritted teeth to resist the urge to scream.

And just as Harry felt the first projectiles of debris hit him over his back, he also heard a loud grunt coming from the opposite wall.

“A... _Aguamenti!_ ”

Hermione, bless her sharp mind, was the first to react to the chaos. When Harry looked up to see what was going on, she had already cast the spell, hitting Aragon right in the face as he was running towards them. It didn't really affect him the way it would affect a normal human being or magic creature, but it still surprised and stilled him long enough to create an opening.

An intense azure bolt of _frigid_ energy shot past Ron's head, barely missing the side of his face, and impacted against Aragon with enough violence to make him stagger back. The prince looked past the ice forming around him and opened his mouth to say something, only to fall silent the moment the frozen water encased him whole.

Hermione cut the flow of magic, ending the spell just as this one was threatening to freeze all the way up to her wand. It created some sort of jutting cone with smooth curves where the water had been more raging in its path, rendering the whole structure somewhat awe inspiring if the situation was not what it was.

The substitute-but-not-really-substitute DADA professor looked past Hermione's frozen spell and took in the large block of ice standing over what used to be a door that had survived a savage war just one year ago. It was clear, smooth and just as cold as the shard Ron had brought back from Diagon Alley, with several spikes growing from the back and away from the impact point.

If it wasn't for the one growing towards Hermione, the whole thing would look like a comet flying through the sky, with its tail trailing behind it.

“Blimey...” Ron's voice filled the sudden silence, shaking his two friends out of their daze. “'Mione! You're amazing!”

Hermione lowered her wand and steadied her breathing as she realize that the immediate danger was gone. She stared for a few moments at Aragon, perhaps being bemused a bit too much by the sight, then slowly turned around to face the small form half crumpled against the wall.

Because Winter, or whatever his name was, _was_ small. If he was human, Hermione would have given him no more than fifteen years. Still, despite his thin build, she could see the muscles through the several lacerations of what little of his clothes remained after who knows how many battles. Even his ragged hooded cloak had been torn to shreds and was absent from his back.

Uncertain on how to treat a spirit like him, she knelt down at his side and let her hands hover a few inches from his shoulder. “Are... are you alright?” she asked, biting her lip and silently beating herself for the stupid question.

The young boy looked up at her with his green eyes and gave a small smile. “Nice save, there,” he commented, blatantly ignoring his wounds. “You helped more than you think.”

“I didn't really know if Aguamenti would work,” Hermione replied, trying to not think about all the green blood slowly seeping out of those deep cuts. “I didn't read all the book and... all I read so far is that... your kind is not affected by magic like us... and... are you going to be alright? How can we help? Can we even help?!?”

She was growing frantic by the minute, but stopped when Winter laughed tiredly and shifted to sit up straight. He leaned against the wall and waved his right arm into the air while the other remained limp at his side, too mangled to even twitch.

“I'll be fine!” he reassured. “I have a friend that will fix this as soon as I get to him.”

Hermione was not convinced. Harry was not convinced. Even Ron was not convinced.

But the fact remained that they had no idea how to help. If they tried, chances were that they would cause more harm than good. In the worst case scenario, they could even end up killing him by mistake.

The young spirit held up his good hand and let Aragon's amulet dangle from his fingers, creating a huge color contrast with his torn white glove. “Can you hand this to the FarFrozen yetis?” he asked, his voice feeble and lacking the echo that had been there when he first appeared. “They'll be here soon to tie things up. Don't worry, they are good guys.”

Harry cautiously grabbed the amulet with his wand, not trusting physical contact with something that could turn someone into a giant dragon. “Alright, but what about you?”

Winter closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. His body sagged against the wall, strangely becoming smaller with the motion. “I'll be fine. Just need a nap...”

As the spirit fell into a restless sleep, Harry looked at Ron, then at Hermione. Then back to Ron for a few moments before glancing at the frozen Aragon and the war zone visible behind him. In that moment, he decided that he should take up on Minerva's offer of a relaxing tea in the comforts of the teachers' lounge.

He didn't know if it could help him, but he was sure it could help the Headmistress with the stress issue when he was going to tell her why the school had been partially destroyed.

 


	7. Chapter 07

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please, do forgive any error. My works do not have beta readers. Enjoy the chapter!

The first thing that happened after Winter fell unconscious was the rapidly worsening weather. It went from a cold day to a raging blizzard in a matter of minutes, casting the castle into a bluish darkness that chilled any mortal's soul to the core.

“Harry!” Ron called, raising his voice so that he could be heard above the howling winds and the battering of the hail against stone. “What's happening now?!”

Harry didn't reply at first, too transfixed on the icy mayhem happening just outside the gaping hole that had once been the main entrance to the school. This was no normal weather. Perhaps not even a magic-induced one. It was too sudden and too rapid of a change to be. Something of that scale would require too much magic power and involve many Merlin-level wizards to achieve. And it would take time.

Although it was a possibility that the weather changing spell could have been started way before Aragon had arrived, Harry doubted it. The temperature, after all, had dropped with Winter's presence alone. Not by much, but it still made him realize that the spirit had been influencing it enough to be noticeable.

Not to mention that the spirit had mentioned something about the arrival of yetis.

“Something's coming!” he called back to Ron. “Maybe we should move back inside! Get away from this cold before we're all frozen to death!”

Because, really, whoever was able to create a blizzard like that in a matter of minutes was certainly powerful. He just hoped they were as good as Winter made them to be.

“Harry!”

Hermione's call snapped said wizard out of his thoughts, drawing his attention away from his inner thoughts to her and their other problem. She looked pale, probably due to the cold, and her eyes were focusing on the still form laying haphazardly against the wall. Her hands, usually firm and precise, were shacking minutely right above the spirit's shoulder while her wand was laying on the ground near her. Harry idly noticed that it had been placed far enough to not get in the way, but still close enough that she could quickly reach for it if she needed.

“What do you think we should do with him?” Hogwarts' youngest DADA professor asked her. He wanted to get out of the cold as soon as possible, yet he didn't want to leave without first making sure the spirit was going to be alright. They had no idea if these creatures could die, be permanently crippled or if they could recover completely from severe wounds. He might be impulsive most of the time, but he wasn't stupid. There was still so much that they didn't know about them, and he bet that the whole 'spirit' category wasn't even covering half of what they were.

The girl in question opened her mouth, then snapped it shut when she realized she had no valid solution. It was a rare occurrence for her to not know an answer to a problem, and it showed that there was a limit to her knowledge too.

“I think we should just leave,” Ron said, gaining the attention of the other two. He was looking outside, eyes narrowed against the raging chaos of ice and snow and arms around himself to keep warm. His wand was poking out of a closed fist and shacking along with it. “And leave the guy here. I'm sure his... friends will take care of him. So, let's just go?”

Harry looked at Ron with a slight frown, wondering where the brave young wizard that had fought alongside him had gone. He couldn't exactly blame him for wanting to get out of there after all that had happened, but he would have expected him to be a bit more considerate towards someone that had just saved their lives.

Before he could voice his reprimand, however, Hermione nudged him on the shoulder and pointed towards the barely visible courtyard. Harry frowned at her for a moment before following her outstretched arm to try and see past the hail and snow.

“Look, over there,” she murmured, voice almost lost into the howling of the blizzard. “Can you see them?”

Harry narrowed his eyes and stood as still as a statue, fearing that any movement would break his concentration. At first he saw nothing but blurs of whites and blues, but as soon as his eyes started to adjust to the dim light from outside, he saw them.

They were in three, maybe four, and were wandering around the courtyard, with massive tails trailing behind them as they turned left and right. One in particular seemed to direct their movements by raising its huge arms and pointing to different directions. Chances were that there were more of them around, just hidden by the nasty weather.

Harry stood up, and against Ron's terrified protests, he made his way to the broken entrance. A moment later, Hermione was at his side with determination visible on her face. Her shacking hands were put around her mouth and a second later she let out the loudest bellow Harry had ever heard coming from her. He winced, bringing his hand to his ear while glaring at her in displeasure.

Still, yelling seemed to be effective, and at least three of the four visible shapes stopped and turned towards them, seemingly trying to decide if what they heard was real or just a trick of the wind.

Seeing that, Hermione took the opportunity in her hands and breathed deeply. Not even a second later, she was stepping into the raging blizzard and waving an arm above her head. “Hey! Over here! He's this way!”

Her second call sparked the creatures into movement, and soon enough at least two of them were standing in front of the humans. The others seemed to go into a frenzy and were soon surrounding Aragon and discussing among themselves in hushed tones.

Harry observed them for a few moments, then turned his attention back to the two giants in front of him and Hermione. He had to tilt his head back a little to look at them in the face, making it slightly uncomfortable for his neck.

Winter had called them yetis, but Harry didn't see much resemblance to the creatures the wizardry community knew of. Sure, they were big, humanoid and covered in white fur, but no yeti ever had the head of a bear, horns made of ice or sharp claws. Even their lizard-like tail didn't fit the official description. And they were wearing some sort of skirt made out of leather, with some of them going as far as having boots and some sort of decorative bands around their arms.

The one that was staring down at him with intense yellow eyes seemed to have gone a step further by dying its clothes blue and wearing a small cape on its shoulders.

They stood like that for what felt a long time until the beast in blue garments opened its mouth. There were a lot of sharp teeth there, and a small part of Harry's mind wondered how lethal those things could be against a human.

“Are you Harry Potter?”

Surprisingly, the first thing that Harry thought was not that the beast could talk in perfect English, but that his voice was surprisingly light for someone with a body that large. It was like listening to a badly dubbed foreign movie that would play on TV occasionally.

“Uh... yes?” he answered, wishing he could slap his uncooperative mouth. “Yes. That's me. How..? Who... I mean... Greetings?”

Harry felt like throwing himself down a ravine. Here they were, making contact with a new and intelligent species, and all he could do was stammer like an idiot. He was pretty sure he could feel Hermione roll her eyes at his bad attempts at communication and he bet his wand that she would suggest lessons on diplomacy between races in Hogwarts' future years.

Silently, he was agreeing with her.

Still, the yeti accepted his stammering with a small smile on his bear-like muzzle and brought his left arm made of ice and bones against his chest. “Greetings, Harry Potter!” his bellow made the air shake. Kind of like when Winter had first spoken with Aragon. “I am Frostbite, leader of the FarFrozen! The Great One spoke well of you!”

Harry stared blankly at the yeti for a moment, then returned to his senses when he felt Hermione jab discretely at his side with her elbow. “Ah, yes. It's good to meet you too, Frostbite,” he replied once he was sure his tongue wouldn't knot itself. He held up his hand and showed him the pendant dangling from his wand. “He... Winter... the Great One? He said I should give this to you.”

Frostbite's happy demeanor soured and the air around them seemed to get even colder than it already was. “Aragon's dragon amulet.” His statement was met with a curt nod from Harry, confirming what he already knew. “Aragon is no easy opponent. You are lucky your castle still stands.”

The wizard paled at those words, and somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew Hermione was having a similar reaction. When Frostbite held out a white paw, Harry was very happy to let the amulet drop on it and watch it disappear under closing fingers. When he could see it no longer, he felt like a huge weight had been lifted from his shoulders. That resulted into his muscles releasing all the tension he had accumulated since the beginning of the fight against Aragon.

“Chief!”

The sudden voice coming from somewhere behind Harry was nothing short of startling. It sounded worried and urgent, prompting Frostbite into quickly walking past the two humans to reach one of his people crouching next to the fallen spirit.

For a moment Harry was surprised that he had never noticed the hulking beast walking past them, but after casting a quick glance around, he realized that the unnamed yeti wasn't the only thing he had missed. 

First, the yetis around Aragon's ice prison were gone along with it, leaving only an icy stump of sort on the ground. Second, while he was busy with making a fool out of himself with Frostbite, Ron had moved further down the corridor. He was far enough to get away from a sudden attack, but not enough to leave him and Hermione without cover if a fight ever broke out.

“How is the Great One?” Frostbite sounded far more worried than the yeti he was talking to, and judging by the strange sound coming from his throat a moment later, he must have noticed the conditions of the spirit's arm. “Do what you can now, make sure he can be moved safely.”

While the still unnamed yeti went to work on securing Winter's arm and doing whatever else he could do, Frostbite turned around and called to the rest of his people that were still around as some sort of guard for their leader. “Spread out!” he said once he had their attention. “We are leaving!”

Like trained soldiers, which they might as well be considering their quick response to an order, the yetis disappeared into the blizzard with barely a sound. They had been so fast that Harry wondered if they had been there in the first place or if they were nothing but illusions.

“I apologize,” Frostbite was back with Harry and Hermione. His sadness was surprisingly well visible on his beastly face. “I realize you must have a lot of questions, and I assure you they will be answered in due time, but for now we must go. The Great One is in dire need of medical attention.”

The yeti that had called for his chief was behind him now, looking down at the bandaged spirit in his arms with eyes that Harry had only seen on Poppy Pomfrey whenever he was in the hospital wing. “Chief,” he called once he was sure everything was in order for traveling. “I'm ready.”

“Farewell, Harry Potter,” Frostbite said after giving a nod to the yeti, who ran off so fast that he seemed to fly. He slowly walked backwards until he was standing into the raging winds of the blizzard. His fur was whipped around frantically, creating the illusion that he was waving like a mirage. “And stay alert. Aragon will not be the only one sent after Samantha Manson.”

Harry raised a hand, as if to stop the yeti from leaving, only to wave it into a farewell as the leader of the FarFrozen turned around to follow his tribesmen.

“Blimey,” Ron whispered, scaring the hell out of both Harry and Hermione. Apparently, he had walked back to them as soon as the yetis started to move out, but only after Frostbite was gone he found the courage to speak. “Harry, what just happened?!”

The wizard in question sighed deeply. “Honestly?” he asked, letting his shoulders sag as much as they could without physically detaching from his body. “I'm not entirely sure.”


End file.
